Summary: Mr W complained about the Council’s handling of his planning and building regulations applications. We found the Council seriously delayed in determining his building regulations application. It also failed to update him appropriately, did not communicate with him adequately and failed to properly handle his complaints. The Council has agreed to our recommendations.

The complaint

1. The complainant (Mr W) complains about the Council’s handling of his two planning and building regulations applications which relate to two of his properties in its area. I will refer to these as Property A and Property B. Specifically, Mr W’s complaint raises the following:
1. Complaint Outcome (a): The Council’s Building Control team acted unreasonably in respect of his two building regulations applications, sent him unacceptable responses and delayed in assessing one of the applications.
2. Complaint Outcome (b): Though the Council granted planning permission for Property A, this was subject to unreasonable conditions and restrictions imposed by the Ecology Officer concerning the need to conduct an ecological survey to determine the presence of bats.
3. Complaint Outcome (c): When he withdrew his planning application for Property B, the Council continued to send him an invoice for the costs of the building regulations application, despite this clearly no longer being necessary. Moreover, he says the Council went on to threaten him with enforcement action for these costs, despite earlier saying these were waived.
4. Complaint Outcome (d): The Council’s communications and contact with him has been poor and points to poor complaint handling and case oversight.
2. In summary, Mr W says his applications have been turned into an unreasonably long process which has delayed his work. Further, he says the planning conditions for Property A states an ecological survey must be completed again within one year if building had not yet started. Mr W says he should not be subject to further costs for arranging this when this time period has lapsed solely due to Council delays in the processing of building regulations application. He explains the process has been hugely frustrating and has had financial implications.
3. As a desired outcome, Mr W wants the Council to meet with him and resolve the outstanding issues. He also wants accountability over the alleged failings and implement service improvements to prevent significant delays.

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
5. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended).
6. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone can appeal to a government minister. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to appeal. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(b), as amended).
7. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

How I considered this complaint

8. We considered evidence provided by Mr W and the Council, as well as relevant law, policy and guidance. Both parties were offered an opportunity to comment on our draft decision. We considered any comments made before making a final decision.

My findings

Background, Legislative Framework and Guidance

Planning Applications

9. Local authority power to control development and use of land is set out in the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. Permission is required for any development or change of use of land and may be granted by a Local Planning Authority or deemed to be permitted if it falls within the limits set out in Permitted Development regulations.
10. Permission is required for development, which includes building, engineering or other works in, on, over or under land, or the material change in use of any buildings or land.
11. A full permission will grant permission for all aspects of a proposal, though usually permission is granted subject to planning conditions. A full application should be made for retrospective planning permission, a change of use of land or buildings and the carrying out of mining, engineering or operations other than building operations.
12. Once it is granted, a planning permission is normally limited to 3 years and will expire unless development begins within that time.

Appeal Rights to Planning Inspectorate

13. A planning applicant can appeal the following planning application decisions to the Planning Inspectorate who acts on behalf of the relevant Secretary of State:
1. Refusal of a planning application.
2. Conditions attached to a planning application approval.
3. Failure to decide a planning application within 8 weeks of receipt.
4. Failure to decide a major planning application within 13 weeks of receipt.

Building Regulations

14. Most building work, whether new, alterations, or extensions requires building regulation approval. The Regulations set standards for the design and construction of buildings and also ensure the health and safety of people in and about those buildings. 'Approved documents' give examples of how the Regulations can be met, but these examples do not have to be followed.
15. For most buildings there are two options for getting building regulations approval. These are either from a local authority registered building inspector, or a registered building control approver. A full plans application provides the most thorough checks. The building owner or their agent submits plans for approval. Building work is checked on site by an Inspector for compliance with the Regulations (not compliance with the approved plans). Decisions are made within 5 weeks, or 2 months with the applicant’s consent. The Council will issue a completion certificate within 8 weeks which states the work is compliant with the Regulations. If the work is not compliant, the Council will issue advice on how it can be made so.

Chronology of events

16. In mid-June 2023: Mr W made two building regulations applications to the Council for both Property A and Property B.
17. The next month, Mr W submitted two planning applications to the Council, again for both Property A and Property B. On the same day, Mr W received a letter from the Council’s Building Control team acknowledging his building regulations applications and quoted a five-week turnaround from that date for approval.
18. In mid-September 2023, there was a delay in the determination of Mr W’s planning application for Property B. Mr W said the application was not withdrawn but delayed due to an unresolved dispute with the Council over ecology requirements. Mr W says that despite planning consent no longer being needed for Property B, the Council still went on to approve the building regulations application for the same property and demanded a sum of £450 in respect of this. Mr W did not want to pay due to this application not proceeding and contacted the Council about this.
19. The following month, Mr W’s planning application was approved by the Council subject to conditions, some of which he disagreed with. The condition Mr W was unhappy with was that no works are to take place unless in accordance with a precautionary method statement under the supervision of the project ecologist to determine the presence of bats. The condition further imposed that the findings within this ecological report would only remain valid for a period of one year from the date of the survey (until Summer 2024). This caused Mr W frustration as he had never seen any bats and, given the delays by the Council approving his buildings regulations application for Property A, this would surely mean him needing to pay for a new survey to be completed unnecessarily.
20. At around the same time, the Council confirmed building regulations approval had been given for Property B. Mr W says the Council should not have continued to process this application when the planning application had been withdrawn which clearly made the other application redundant. The Council demanded a sum of £450 in respect of this, though this was disputed by Mr W who contacted the Council about this.
21. In late 2023, the Council contacted Mr W to advise him that he could disregard the invoice he had been sent in respect of his application for Property B. It apologised for the confusion, said this was commenced in error and that it would cancel the invoice.
22. In early 2024, the Council confirmed building regulations approval had still not been given in respect of Property A. Mr W contacted to chase this and he received an email from a Council officer stating the team is experiencing a “massive backlog” due to increased demand and that once these had been dealt with, he would try and turn to Mr W’s applications.
23. In early 2024, Mr W received a reminder notice from the Council demanding the £450 he had only months earlier said had been cancelled. The notice threatened to commence enforcement action though a debt collection agency.
24. Three months later, Mr W raised a formal complaint to the Council which mirrors to the complaint summary set out at Paragraph 1 (above).
25. In mid-2024, the Council issued a Stage One complaint response to Mr W’s complaint. It did not uphold the complaint and explaining the condition for the need of a survey was taken by a professional ecological officer who was exercising their professional judgement and that there was no evidence to question the merits of her decision. Dissatisfied with the response, Mr W escalated his complaint to the next stage of the complaint procedure.
26. One month later, the Council issued its Stage Two complaint response. The Council largely endorsed the findings of the earlier of the previous response which it felt had appropriately investigated the complaint. The complaint was again not upheld. However, the Council had not responded to all parts of Mr W’s complaint, namely: Complaints Outcomes (a), (c) and (d).
27. In late 2024, Mr W brought his complaint to Ombudsman. However, noting the Council had not responded to Mr W’s complaints as regards to delay in approving his building regulations application for Property A, we asked the Council to issue a response on this matter before beginning our work. We placed Mr W’s case on hold until we received that response and further information.
28. In early 2025, the Council issued its final complaint response, this time looking at the building regulations issues. The Council acknowledged that it has a legal obligation to determine such applications within five weeks and that as of the date of its response letter, the application had still not been determined. The Council upheld Mr W’s complaint, including accepting fault in the way it chased a cancelled invoice and threatened enforcement action, as well for poor communication and complaint handling. The Council promised to make decision on application in the next two weeks which Mr W has confirmed it did.
29. Still unhappy with how the Council had dealt with his complaint, Mr W referred his complaint back to the Ombudsman which we then reopened.

My Assessment

Time Limits Jurisdiction

30. Mr W first contacted the Ombudsman in July 2024. At that time, the complaint was considered premature because the Council had not yet provided a full response to all the issues raised. We asked the Council to issue a further response and placed the case on hold. The complaint was formally reopened in December 2024, once it became clear that a substantive response had still not been provided. Some aspects of the complaint, such as the delay in determining the building regulations application, arose in mid to late 2023. While this means certain elements may fall just outside the normal 12-month time limit for bringing a complaint to us, I am satisfied Mr W acted reasonably by continuing to pursue the matter with the Council. In these circumstances, we have exercised discretion to investigate the complaint in full.
31. However, we cannot investigate any fault and injustice beyond the date we accepted Mr W’s complaint to us. This was February 2025 when the Council issued a further response to Mr W’s complaint which addressed all issues.

Complaint Outcome (a): Building Regulations Applications

32. Section 16 of the Building Act 1984 mandates that local authorities must determine a building regulation application within five weeks from the date of deposit. As acknowledged by the Council, as of February 2025, it had not yet determined the building regulations application for Property A. This amounts to a serious delay of 20 months. The Council upheld this part of Mr W’s complaint, as it was right to do. The Council was at fault and this caused an injustice to Mr W whose property works were unfairly delayed by this, as well as that it has caused him significant uncertainty, stress and time and trouble. To remedy the injustice caused, the Council offered to refund Mr W’s building regulations application fee and waive the inspection fee once the development works had been completed.

Complaint Outcome (b): Planning Conditions

33. We have no legal jurisdiction to investigate this part of the complaint. The issues concerning the ecological survey and this needing to be completed again if works had not commenced after 12 months was a planning condition. If a planning applicant disagrees with a planning condition, they have a right of appeal to the Planning Inspectorate who acts on behalf of the relevant Secretary of State. This is the body Parliament established to consider such matters and I see no reason why it would have been unreasonable for Mr W to exercise his appeal right if aggrieved by its imposition. As such, I cannot investigate this part of the complaint and the restriction I outline at Paragraph 6 (above) applies.

Complaint Outcome (c): Invoice Demand and Threat of Enforcement

34. The Council has accepted fault in respect of the escalatory invoice notice sent to him despite only months before confirming it had been cancelled. While still fault, this was an isolated incident and, on its own, did not cause a sufficient injustice in my view. But, when taken together with the communication failings identified below, I am satisfied an injustice was caused to him.

Complaint Outcome (d): Poor Communication and Complaint Handling

35. As set out earlier, Mr W made a formal complaint to the Council in April 2024 and he promptly escalated his complaint when the Council issued its first response. Despite this, the Council did not provide a final response until February 2025. This substantially exceeds the timeframes for complaint responses set out in the Council’s complaints policy and so I find fault. The Council has also accepted the way it communicated with Mr W over the time he was experiencing these issues was not to standard. In my view, these further faults aggravated the significant uncertainty, stress and time and trouble Mr W was already experiencing and so I do find he was caused an injustice. However, I consider the Council’s actions to refund his application fee and to waive a future cost provides a sufficient remedy to this. Even so, I have made further recommendations as detailed below.

Agreed action

36. To remedy the injustice identified, the Council has agreed to take the following actions (and within the timeframes) set out below:
1. Within one month of the date of my final decision statement, the Council will:

• Send Mr W a written apology which acknowledges the fault and injustice identified in this decision statement, as well as the specific actions it intends to take to prevent such problems from reoccurring.

• Pay Mr W £1,000 (£50 per month) to acknowledge the loss amenity he suffered by reason of the 20 months delay to his building works.
2. Within three months of the date of my final decision, the Council will:

• Undertake a review at a senior level in relation to the backlog of applications and produce a plan for clearing this.

37. The Council will provide evidence it has complied with the above actions.

Final decision

38. We have found fault causing an injustice to Mr W for the reasons detailed. The Council has agreed to our recommendations.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman